The Long Night
by bingbingwahoo
Summary: They both have their vices. He's become like Mance in his stubbornness - and she's become her father in her tyranny. But the Night King doesn't wait for political squabbles to resolve themselves.


They both have their vices. He's become like Mance in his stubbornness - and she's become her father in her tyranny. But the Night King doesn't wait for political squabbles to resolve themselves.

An AU in which Dany and Jon never resolve their differences on Dragonstone.

 **A/N - this is a little rough, but I just wanted to get this out of my brain and into words. Really enjoy this pairing and the dynamics they bring. The incest irks me a bit, but I'm alright writing about it as long as their reasons for getting together aren't based on the incest being a fetish. Kind of upset with how the show is handling the plot lines, but I'm all for these two.**

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"Do you remember that night?" Daenerys is quiet, her voice a timid whisper. Jon nods blankly. He relives it every night. Every morning. Every moment since.

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 _He remembered the last time he had seen Winterfell - nearly a year ago. Within its stone towers, chaos and brimstone had erupted overnight. The men had thought the noise to be thunder in the beginning, but Jon knew that noise. The howls and screeches tore through the night's silence, like an alarm signalling death. They had only somewhat recovered from the Boltons over the past year. Parts of the castle had been repaired from where they were breached, either from Ramsay or Theon's abuses. But a man could only do so much when winter was coming. The castle was strong, yes, but it was meant to stave off winter, not dragons._

 _He had dressed in a hurry, nearly forgetting Longclaw in his rush. Swiftly he made his way to the stables, where the horses were bucking and baying. The stablemaster had managed to tack only a few horses at the end of the row, so Jon took the reigns of a random dark brown stallion and led him out. Men ran among the battlements, hurrying to put out fires. He could see his own breath in in the icy air as he mounted his steed. His gloved hands clutched the reigns and his heels dug into the horse's sides to hurry the beast along._

 _"Open the gate!" Jon called through the night to his men. He could see Sansa at the entrance the the great hall, delegating duties. He was proud of her for staying so calm, for she may have been the only one in the castle who remained that way. Most of the men had stopped and stared at the blinding fire that billowed from the dragon's mouth, several dropping their swords and simply succumbing to their disbelief - and the flames._

 _The gate groaned as it was opened, and Jon rode smoothly toward it. "Gather arms!" he called hoarsely. He was no fool. He knew Winterfell - nor any castle in Westeros - could endure the full might of three dragons. He would not have his men die without dignity and arms though. He would lead, and hopefully he would save them._

 _He slipped through the open gate - not waiting for the metal bars to be opened all the way."Close it!" he hollered after he was clear of the castle._

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"I lost everything that night," he says. He can hear the dripping of rain from somewhere outside. It is a cold and windy night on Dragonstone.

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 _He rode through the open fields outside of Winterfell, watching the sky intently. From where he stood he could see the beasts and the refection of their scales in the moonlight. They drew nearer, growing larger as they slowed to a gentle glide just above the ground. The largest landed first, and Jon swore he could feel the earth shake with a thud upon contact. He drew in the reigns of his horse with one hand and calmed the beast with the other._

 _"End this!" he called, knowing very well the Dragon Queen was hidden somewhere on its back. The beast let out a low growl as she dismounted._

 _"Bend the knee," she spoke simply, her voice as cold as it was the first time she had requested this on Dragonstone._

 _Jon swallowed and looked to his castle, blocking out the screams as one of the two remaining dragons swooped in and drowned the screams in fire. He shook his head, "I cannot. And if I do now, I cannot possibly keep their loyalty."_

 _He could see the Targaryen follow his gaze to the burning castle, "Then they will all die, and you will have no choice."_

 _This was not his destiny. It should have been Robb in his place. The trueborn son of Ned Stark would have had the North's loyalty regardless of bending the knee or not. Robb might have even been able to best the queen on an occasion or two. But Robb wasn't here. He would never wear the heavy pelts that draped upon the shoulders of Winterfell's Lord again. He would never be back in Winterfell to join the other Starks in life or death. His head had been mounted upon a spike and his wolf had been slaughtered._

 _"Daenerys," he choked out, "Don't do this. The North is the only thing between the dead and your throne."_

 _She must have not heard it, for she beckoned her steed to rise, and with a few powerful gusts of the wings, they descended on Winterfell._

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"I remember how the castle burned. The screams as my men burned," Jon speaks quietly to the woman, coming back to present day. They had skirted around this story for a month.

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 _He remembers now, as he sits and reflects, how helpless he was. He had ridden his horse to the gate, heels kicking into his horse - but never going fast enough. He could only watch through the metal grating as men burned alive, the screams of those he knew - those who fought for him to reclaim the Stark family home - were lost within seconds to the heat and flames. He can only watch, and that is what kills him inside every time he revisits the memory._

 _He listens as the screams die down and all he can hear is silence as the castle burns. Occasionally a sound is heard - but it is rubble shifting or wood giving in and becoming ash. The Godswood somewhere within the walls dies. He wonders if the crypt has given in on its foundations. He wonders if Ghost died quickly._

 _By morning the Dragon Queen is long gone, and Winterfell smells of ash and death. The King in the North is no King at all._

 _._

He thinks of the men who died, of Sansa, of how in all the years Winterfell stood, this was how it ended. The great castle always needed a Stark, and now there were no more.

"How did you escape North?" she inquires.

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 _It takes Jon two days to find a way into the castle. He scales the walls like he remembered Bran doing, but he isn't limber and light enough to get in. He walks through Winter Town - a smoldering pile of ash itself - for anything useful, and finally he finds a thick braided rope and rusted boat anchor hidden under some rubble. It takes several tries, but he is able to secure the anchor within the castle's wall, lodging it between cracks in the faded stone. He pulls himself up the wall with strength he does not know he has._

 _Smoke still rises from the castle inside its walls. The fires have died down, but white ash covers the ground like a fresh snowfall. He sees burnt corpses - many burnt to the bone so that no semblance of man remained. He sits within the ashes, and he is a King no more._

 _He stays in Winterfell for several days, salvaging any food he can find, before a groan somewhere off in the north wakes him from his reverie of self-pity. He does not know it then, but the dead have breached the Wall, and the noise is the great divider of the realms crumbling into a pile of snow and ice. Winter has come. There is nothing left for Jon Snow in the North, so he takes his mount and rides south._

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"I never escaped the North," Jon mutters, "After that night, there was nothing left of the North. Nothing left for me."

He keeps himself warm by the brazier of fire between them, "I tried to end it all. I didn't want this life."

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 _Near the Twins he hears the news through word of mouth. The Wall has fallen and no further word has been heard from the Night's Watch nor Winterfell since the single raven had arrived. That night, he takes his own life, stabbing himself through the gut with Longclaw. He feels true freedom for the first time in weeks, and as he falls to his knees and blood oozes from his wound, a soft hand touches his face and all he can see is red._

 _He wakes with a start, eyes peering over him, "The Lord of Light is not done with you, Jon Snow," the woman says. It isn't Melissandre, but this woman is dressed in red and has the same starved look in her eyes when she stares at him. She hands him his sword, his own blood dry on the blade and his chest a little more empty in the place he had wounded himself. He leaves small shack she has been treating him in without another word. The woman does not follow._

 _The Kingsroad is suddenly much more crowded than he remembers. He passes congregations of riders - many noting that it has never snowed this far south - until now. Rumors that something has happened in the North - and it isn't just Winterfell. The Dread Fort and even places as close to the Neck as White Harbor no longer send ravens. In fact, no one going North has returned in weeks. Jon clutches his furs closer to his chest as he rides, remaining quiet._

 _When he hits the crossroads he breaks from the Kingsroad and journeys eastward. Jon has never been a man for revenge, but he no longer knows who he is or who he even once was. His course is set for Dragonstone, where he knows the Dragon Queen awaits._

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"The Wall fell," he says, "And the moment it fell we all were doomed."

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 _Jon had arrived soaking wet at the island. The small wooden sailboat he had used to ferry himself to the island was all he could afford, but it had served its purpose. Even through rough weathers, the small craft was resilient and withstanded being battered by winds and waters that would have made a Greyjoy nervous. He knew he had arrived at Dragonstone. He remembered the first time he arrived here with Davos, a meeting that would prove to be futile. Now, as he looked upon the castle nestled upon the cliffs, he thought it to be abandoned. There was no sound of dragon wings, nor were there unsullied or Dothraki warriors to greet him as he made his way up the long path to the keep._

 _Instead, all he found was a dragon-less Queen._

 _He had thought about what he would have done when he found her since the night she burned his home. A part of him wanted revenge, yes, but he was Ned Stark's son. Even if he would never be worthy of such a title, he knew his father would have frowned at the idea of slaying this woman. It was not justice._

 _When Jon Snow found her, he saw someone just as broken as he was._

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"How did they die?" Jon asks softly.

Daenerys does not look at him, "I went North to investigate rumors... Tyrion urged me not to..." she draws off, and her voice fades, "I lost a dragon that day to the dead."

"And the other two?" Jon is careful not to pry too much, but he does not have much to lose at this point. The woman across from him has already taken everything.

"One to the Lannisters. I had gone with Tyrion to negotiate with them. To tell his sister of what was to come. But it was a trap." It is all she says, but Jon does not need any more details to understand. He has only seen the Queen and her brother once before. But that was long ago, in a different time when Kings did not tear apart the land with their wars.

He does not ask for more details, but she continues, a sort of pride and bravery within her needing to let loose, "I rallied my unsullied and Dothraki to meet them - the dead." She gives a grim smile, "Even with dragonglass weapons and Drogon - my last child, we could not stop them. It was lost," her voice cracks and she needs to compose herself, "I came back here to lick my wounds. All my allies had died. I've lost everything."

Jon nods his head and leans against the stone walls, "That makes two of us."

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Jon does not sleep at night. He never does. The howling of the winds in this castle reminds him of being on top of the wall, and sometimes in his memories he goes back to his time in the Watch. He regrets so much. He regrets not asking Ned about his mother sooner. He regrets leaving Robb to go to war alone. He regrets not staying in the cave with Ygritte. He regrets not bending the knee.

Daenerys doesn't sleep either. They spend time together, but in silence. She is the reason for his misery, but in a way he is also the reason for hers. His stubbornness lost them the War for the Dawn before the war had even begun. He laughs to himself at the thought. They've had so many self-proclaimed kings in Westeros over the past several years, and all nearly all had made the same mistakes.

He catches fish during the days, as Dragonstone's food stores had run empty long ago. Thankfully the waters near the island are plentiful with fish, and the former Queen is willing to eat anything - even if poorly made. She always seems happier during their meals, perhaps grateful for his efforts and willingness to share.

"I've eaten a horse heart before," she tells him, "This cannot possibly be that bad."

He doesn't inquire further, and instead provides her with the charred fish he's butchered. She makes a face as she takes her first bite, but pulls herself together and eats her meal without complaint.

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Most nights on Dragonstone are cold and damp. The sea-spray ensures the smell of salt in the air as the waves crash against the cliffs of the island, and Jon quickly grows sick of it. He misses the trees from the Wolfswood and the smell of fertile soil and dew in the mornings. Dragonstone is no place for a Stark.

They spend most of their time in silence, having little to say to each other. They don't particularly like each other. It's a mutual tolerance based on the fact that they both fucked up royally. For Jon, Dany is the only thing he has that remains of his life before the War for the Dawn. For Dany, Jon is the only one who is willing to look past her mistakes.

Their days are spent apart. Jon disappears to explore the island, while Dany stays behind locked doors. He sometimes returns with mud up to his waist, and Daenerys helps him gather pails of rainwater to prepare a bath. It's the one plus-side of it constantly raining. In return he scours the library for books on herbs and manages to gather some spices for their meals. It's the little things - these exchanges - that begin to heal the wounds that have torn Jon so deeply.

She keeps the castle neat and tidy, as if they are expecting guests. He supposes this is her way of still keeping hope - something Jon has lost long ago. His heart aches when he thinks of what had become of the mainland. He should be happy everyone in Winterfell and Winter Town was burned. That way they wouldn't suffer eternally in the army of the dead. But oh, he wishes that he could go back and just bend the knee.

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He finds himself hating how he enjoys her company. The wistful manner in which she pulls her hair back each morning. No longer is it done up in intricate designs by handmaidens, and when he sees her struggling to untangle knots of her silver hair, he takes the brush from her hand and sits behind her to do it himself. He's never brushed a woman's hair, and while his is longer than average for a man, he seldom has knots and tangles. Occasionally Arya would come to him for some help - not wanting old Nan to pull and hurt her. The thought of his youngest sister causes a smile to appear on his face, and he pretends for a moment that Dany is Arya and he is back in Winterfell.

She's become a different person - perhaps the person she was before she became the Mother of Dragons. Losing her children (it is still strange to refer to dragons in this manner for Jon) has cast all bravado aside, and what's left is fear and uncertainty. He sees glimpses of the woman she was though. There is power in the way she walks, power behind her words - but it's all a ruse. He knows this. But he doesn't point it out. He doesn't want to lose anything more. He can't handle it.

He isn't sure when he begins to _need_ her. He cannot imagine leaving this island - at least without her. He does not love her, and he doesn't lust after her. Instead, Jon simply feels that this is what is life is now. He is devoted to her in a way the snow and the cold is devoted to the North. That salt is to the sea, or Lannisters and Lions. He is both the most miserable he has ever been and the most complete he has been. He no longer wants more - as he did on the watch. He isn't bound to duty as a King. He is just Jon here. Not a bastard. He has found himself content, but at the same time, he has no other choice.

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"Winter has come," Jon says as he watches the white flecks land upon the rocks. A neat and clean layer had formed overnight. He grabs his furs and drapes them across his shoulders for warmth before exiting to the balcony.

"The words of the Starks," Daenerys' voice spooks him at first.

Jon shakes his head, "Winter is coming. Those are the Stark words."

"Perhaps I should have heeded them more," she mutters, "I could not have dreamed it would end like this." She leans against the stone rail.

He does not comment, instead moving on, "Did I ever tell you about Mance? The King Beyond the Wall?" Dany shakes her head.

"I was serving the Night's Watch and we went beyond the wall..." he knows he is going to leave parts of this story out. "North of the wall, it's where the freefolk live. They don't kneel to any king. Aye, the Targaryens tried, the Baratheons tried, everyone's tried. Nay, they don't kneel. But Mance comes and he unites them. I was to get him to kneel. Stannis, brother of the dead King Robert, he wanted me to get Mance to kneel to save the freefolk. It would have saved 'em all. I begged with the man, even though he knew if he did not kneel his brothers would suffer and he himself would be burned alive."

Jon swallows the lump in his throat, "He was burned, but I put an arrow into his heart before he could suffer. The man lost everything because he would not kneel. And I made the same mistake."

"You did," Dany affirms, "But you are not Mance Rayder." She places a hand on his arm, "The only thing you have in common with him is you did not kneel. But I was foolish, expecting a king to kneel."

"I've never been a king," Jon tells her, and he believes it truly.

"You were more a king than I was a queen," she says, "You had people willing to follow you. I had an army. Now that I look back, I can see myself for what I was - a conqueror."

"My brother Robb was a king. A true one. I never wanted to be Lord of Winterfell, I never wanted any of this." Jon shrugs Dany's hand off his arm and goes back inside without a word.

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They keep it lighthearted after their talk of Mance and kings. Jon busies himself sealing cracks in the castle and properly barricading and emptying rooms that had begun to crumble. The castle was impeccably well built, but even Jon know that the greatest towers could fall. He'd heard the stories of Harrenhall, and while there wasn't a threat of a dragon to tear it down, weather was any fortress's greatest enemy.

Ships appeared often on the horizon. Greyjoys, Jon reckoned. That or men escaping Westeros. None ever came close enough to the island for him to tell. He was not too worried though. Dragonstone had been designed with these things in mind, having a small beach and towering cliffs cascading into the water to provide a natural defense. If anyone were to journey ashore, there was only one place they could possibly go - unless they liked climbing.

It did occur to Jon that the dead could use a ship to travel to their island, but in all the years the Wall had stood, they did not dare do such a thing. At Hardhome they had been proven to not swim as well. Still, Jon kept and oil stocked on the island in case they needed fire. They would have to use the firewood to keep warm sparingly. Perhaps only on the worst of nights. Instead, there were a multitude of furs and blankets that had been collecting mothballs in the castle. He gathered as many as he could, folding them neatly into piles and placing about half in his room and the other half in Dany's. He felt like a handmaiden.

There were good things about the winter. For one, he could stock up on fish by freezing them. He would carefully clean and fillet the fishes, packing snow around them. Dany insisted on helping as well, and he taught her how to get the small, almost invisible bones out. Her small hands worked delicately and studiously, using a small blade and a pail of melted snow to clean it.

Water was also much easier to come by, if you didn't mind it being extraordinarily cold. One could gather snow and bring it inside the castle. Within a few hours it would melt, and you had fresh water. Jon didn't bathe that often, but when he did it was scathingly cold, and he was not willing to waste firewood to heat it. Dany did enjoy her baths though. Or at least she had before the winter had begun and they were more willing to use the firewood. She was smaller and while she could withstand burning hot waters, the cold was hellish on her skin. She had caught ill after the incident. From then on, Jon would often heat the water despite her protests.

He spent less time outside the castle in the winter. More time bundled up inside, reading books in the library and walking through the castle. In many ways Dragonstone was unlike Winterfell. Where Winterfell was ancient, plain, and humble, Dragonstone was designed like a fortress. It was an imposing reminder of the might of the dragons and of the House Targaryen's bloody past. Carvings of stone dragons were everywhere, and many of the more intimidating rooms themselves seemed to be chiseled straight from the earth itself.

Jon found the remnants of Stannis' stay on the island to be most interesting though. An occasional stag adorned banner had been forgotten to be taken down. To which Dany would cross her arms and rip off the wall - if she were with him.

"I was born here," she told him, "Dragonstone is my home." He understood. Bolton banners upon Winterfell had left him with the very same feeling.

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They're both awake, like they usually are. Racing thoughts and bad memories always surface at night, and so Jon spends his time sitting with her on her bed, books gathered around them. He was never much for reading, even when Sam tried his very best to intrigue him with stories. There were always things to do - things that needed to be done, and he was the only one who could do them. Now, with all the time in the world, he found himself enjoying the stories of kings of the past. Dany would chime in on an occasion, supplying extra details that had not been written within the pages. And in return, he told her of the Starks and their stories. Of Bran the Builder, of Heart-trees, and of the Wall.

"I climbed the wall," he tells her as he leans back, "I climbed it for... I don't know how long. It was ages. And all I wanted to do when I got to the top was to collapse and not move for a week. Instead, I looked off the wall at all the green on one side... and all the white on the other. I had been on top of the wall before, but this was different." He doesn't mention Ygritte or Tormund. He doesn't want to think of what had become of them.

She lies down, "How?"

He pauses to think, "Instead of being up there on watch duty, I was looking at all that green on the south side, with men who had never seen such green before. I shared that moment with 'em."

She lifts her hand in silence, pressing it to his chest, wordlessly feeling the beat of his heart. As if for confirmation that he was real. "Do you think there's anyone still alive on the mainland?"

Jon isn't sure, "I reckon the Greyjoys are still around. Mormonts that stayed on their island. Maybe some escaped off boats."

"I dreamed of taking the Iron Throne since I was young," she tells him, "I conquered cities in Essos and I have toiled and worked for what I have become. But all I could have done would have never prepared me for the wights."

Wordlessly, and with nothing to lose, he moves his hand to rest atop hers on his chest.

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He loves her. Not in the urgent, fleeting way he loved Ygritte. There is no sense of worrying about time with Dany, worrying about their place in the world. Because like it or not, they are all they have now. He doesn't love her because she's his only choice, and he hers. He loves her because even after all the torment and death and pain she has caused him, she is the reason he has found meaning in his life once again. Jon has died twice, been brought back twice, and each time a part of him is gone. But with Dany, he feels whole again. He feels content eating fish every day, bathing in cold water, and never leaving Dragonstone.

He knows this isn't what he had in mind when he first left Winterfell. If given the chance, he'd have split her in two with Longclaw, in vengeance for all the Starks that had been slain by Targaryens. What a wonder it would have been to end the line right there. The ultimate form of justice between two houses.

When he had arrived on Dragonstone, he slept for days. He forced himself to stay awake during the voyage there, and the long walk up to the castle had drained him of any energy he thought he had left. He took his furs off, using the pelt as a pillow and closed his eyes in front of the granite throne. Several days later, whilst looking for food, Jon found her in a small, empty room. She probably thought him to be a dream or an illusion. Some sort of cruel magic brought him here to serve her a final justice. He drew his sword, with tears in his eyes and with a pang in his chest.

She was not the Queen who burnt Winterfell to the ground. At least, she no longer was. She was broken, empty, and alone. Just like him. Jon wonders if Ned would be proud, or if by succumbing to his feelings for the former queen would have shamed the man. He wonders all the time what Ned would have thought. Was losing her children enough of a penance to pay for her sins?

Dragonstone feels like home in a way he can't explain. While Winterfell was where he grew up, where he was raised, he always had felt the ire of Lady Catelyn's gaze. There were places, such as the crypts, where he felt uncomfortable even setting foot in. But the island is not home because of where it is, it is home because of Dany. He knows he doesn't belong here, and that the stone dragons are snarling at him, for he is a Stark. But there is nowhere else he would rather be than here.

'A Targaryen alone in the world. It's a terrible thing.' Master Aemon's words are more true than Jon will ever know. The last two Targaryens will never be alone.


End file.
